BD Index for oral cancer screening v1
Research type
Research Study
Full title
The use of biomarkers Defensins 2 and 3 for screening of oral cancer in a high-risk population in East London.
IRAS ID
273676
Contact name
Anwar R. Tappuni
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Barts Health NHS Trust
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
N/A, N/A
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 0 months, 0 days
Research summary
The number of new cases of oral cancer in Tower Hamlets is much higher than the UK average and represents a major health problem. Certain habits such as tobacco use and betel-quid chewing seem to contribute to lesions in the mouth that might lead to oral cancer. Patients’ survival rate improves if cancer is diagnosed promptly and treatment is implemented when the cancer is at an early stage. However, the current gold standard for oral cancer diagnosis is obtaining a biopsy, which is costly, invasive, and associated with potential patient morbidity. Furthermore, over 95% of oral biopsies conducted by dentists turn out to be non-cancerous. There is a clear unmet need for a rapid, objective, non-invasive, and low-cost method to detect early oral cancer in high-risk populations. Such a reliable diagnostic tool would be of great benefit for patients and the NHS as it would avoid the unnecessary collection of biopsies from patients with benign lesions, saving time and NHS resources. Most importantly, it will improve patients’ clinical management by allowing early diagnosis and timely intervention. In this project, we aim to collect small tissue specimens (oral brush) from patients undergoing clinical evaluation for oral cancer. Tissue specimens will be analysed to evaluate the use of a novel non-invasive assay to detect oral cancer in high-risk populations, established by a research group in America. Tissue specimen collections will occur only one time per patient and the whole study will last for two years.
REC name
HSC REC A
REC reference
21/NI/0076
Date of REC Opinion
9 Jun 2021
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion